Ladies, women, girls.  Please, listen.  Please. 

I know you.

I know that some of you have been abused your whole life, whether you know it or not. Whether it was subtle and under the radar, or straight up violent. Abused in ways that you can talk about and ways that you can not. Because you don’t remember. Or because you do.

I know you’ve been harassed. I know that over the years you’ve been told what you can and can not do. What you are allowed to do.  You’ve been told by men and other women, too.  And you’ve even been quietly lectured by your very own self. You’ve second-guessed your decisions because of how other people felt.

You’ve been told you are too strong, too big. Or you are too small, too skinny. Too jiggly. You’re too bossy, too bitchy. Too direct, too blunt. Too polite. Too vague. Too forward. Too emotional. Too wishy-washy. You’re too demure, too quiet. Too sexy. You’re too loud. You’ve been told to tone yourself down a bit. You are too much, and then you are not enough.

Slut, angel, whore, girl next-door.

I know your struggle, your pain. I know how hard you have tried to do it all and be all of it.  To everybody. To be the mother. The wife. The sister, the daughter. The aunt.  The provider. The worker, the chef, the tutor, the friend, the house-cleaner, the chauffeur, the gardener, the psychologist.  I know how you have worried and worried some more. I know you’ve had sleepless nights.  I know that you sit yourself down in the backseat over and over again. I know that you have rarely put yourself in front. Because when you do, something goes awry and you end up paying for it.

I know your heart has been broken more than once. And it breaks again, when you look in the mirror and see time lost and time wasted staring back at you. I know how fucking hard it is to have regrets.

I know you’ve been offended, and you’ve had to defend. And I know about the times you’ve had to make excuses to save face.

I know about all the comments and all the suggestions on how you should and could improve yourself. 

I know you’ve had to be a warrior, and you’ve also had to muffle your cries. I know how your soft tears have fallen on deaf ears. You’ve been both fierce and timid on the very same day. I know you’ve had to hide your pain sometimes. I know how often you’ve had to pretend.

I know you’ve been told that what you are wearing is too tight, too young. I know you’ve been told to stop eating, but then, for God’s sake, would you please eat something?

I know about no. I know about thousands of no’s. 

I know you’ve been scolded. And you’ve been handed some rules about your body. I know that other people, people who fear and people who condemn, people who claim to be God-like and yet condone and exacerbate violence, are protected by their right to free speech, but yet you are not allowed to govern your own vagina or your uterus.

I know about being afraid.

I know you have felt alone. And damaged. I know that you’ve looked for love in all the wrong places.  You’ve looked for it in bars, in bottles, and on your heaping plate.

I know that sometimes when you were invited to friends’ houses you envied and marveled at what they had. I know you still do this sometimes. You envy and you covet and you marvel.

I know how much you have fought with your mother. I know how much you have fought with your daughter.  I know how much your words have hurt each other because your way isn’t the best way and neither is hers and she doesn’t know everything and neither do you. We are all still learning about ourselves – clawing our way to the surface.

And I know how hard it was for you to run that damn mile in gym class back in 7th grade. I know you were embarrassed. You felt clumsy because your bouncing chest was just too big for the world.

I know you were flustered when that pervy science teacher made comments about your big breasts in the hallway at school. I know you didn’t know who to talk to. I know how much it bothered you because it triggered a different, distant, secret, stuffed-down memory. I know when and why you started to eat too much, why and when you packed your feelings away.

I know you lied about how happy you were. And I know that some of the funny things you did and said were just to get attention. I understand your fear. I understand your insecurity. I understand your messy parts. I know you’ve been hurt. Teased. Denied. I know you’ve been betrayed by the very people who claim to love you.

Women, ladies, girls, sisters, daughters, mothers. Listen. Please. Our collective hurt comes from both surface, and deep to the bone, cuts. The cuts of a million years. Ones that bubble up and fester. That pour out. That erupt from dormancy to rage – like a volcano, like a storm. Ones that spew blood, not from our veins, but from our souls.  For it’s our souls that are wounded the most, and it’s our souls that must heal. It’s our souls that seek light in order to grow.

I know you.

Like me, you grew anyway.  Like a wildflower pushing up through a choking, concrete crack on a dirty sidewalk, you grew. A side walk chipped and washed away, jack-hammered, and tread upon. Pissed upon. Spit upon, even. Stifled and under-nourished, still you grew. You placed a tiny tear-drenched seed of hope in your pocket, you set your face to the sun, you reached out, and up, and you still grew.

Despite what they said, despite what they told us, despite what we told ourselves. Together, we grew.

Despite all the rules. And in the face lechery, and all the not enough’s, and all the too’s, we grew.

And we are still growing. 

#riotsnotdiets

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